Top Ten Retail Investor Buys & Sells for week ending 2 March 2007

Angus Rigby, Chief Executive Officer, TD Waterhouse, commented: “It has been a tough week for UK investors as global stocks plummeted on Tuesday night slicing over 36.2 billion pounds off share prices in the UK alone. The FTSE 100 index fell by 2.31 per cent, its largest drop since last June, while the Dow Jones suffered its worst decline since the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001. As the Yen rose sharply, fears over the cooling Chinese equity market took hold and speculation escalated over a possible US recession, leaving stocks tumbling around the world. This turbulence sent ripples through the entire global market, hitting mining stocks with fears that demand for raw materials would decline as the Chinese economy winds down. As we reach the end of the week global markets seem to be staging a minor recovery but nervous investors are still split on whether to cut their losses or buy in to the market at the moment.

“Mining outfit BHP Billiton has been traded heavily this week as shares in the company rallied to year highs of 1211.50p before falling off again this week. Analysts at Goldman Sachs recently noted that BHP has one of the strongest growth profiles of the mining giants, retaining a ‘buy’ call on the stock. However analysts will be waiting to see if the weakening demand for metal recently is the beginning of a slump in trade, and whether the Chinese government will decide to take action to curb the country’s surging inflation levels.

“HSBC, Europe’s biggest bank, has been a popular ‘ buy’ with our clients this week, despite a rocky trading period for the bank of late as it posted a profit warning, blaming operations in the States for making bad loans to consumers with bad credit. Despite forecasts of margin declines in the retail sector for 2007, shareholders were buoyed by record full year profits of 5.7 billion pounds which were announced this week. The share price is currently trading at 12 month lows of around the 885p mark after sliding from highs of 1,028p reached last November.

“Shareholders are hoping that the old phrase ‘good things come to those who wait’ will ring true for support services group, Alfred McAlpine, after the Company announced it would be delaying the announcement of its full year figures following allegations of fraud at its Slate subsidiary. In recent sessions the share price shot down with this news to 469.50p, stopping just short of 12 month lows of 409p per share. Investors will be hoping that the new management drafted in to take over at Slate will breathe new life into the company in the coming period.

Top 10 Buys
1 Partygaming
2 Lloyds TSB
3 BP plc
4 Barclays
5 Vodafone
6 HSBC Holdings
7 BHP Billiton
8 BT Group
9 HBOS
10 McAlpine (Alfred)

Top 10 Sells
1 BP
2 Partygaming
3 BHP Billiton
4 Vodafone
5 Royal Bank of Scotland
6 Barclays
7 Lloyds TSB Group
8 British Energy
9 BT Group
10 Xstrata plc

The Top Ten buys and sells are measured as the number of trades carried out in each stock over the previous 7 days.